Mumbai attacker Kasab asks court to hang him: official

NEW DELHI, July 22 (Xinhua) -- Mohammad Ajmal Amir alias Kasab, the only militant caught alive in the Mumbai terror attacks last November, Wednesday told the special court trying him that it may send him to gallows if it thinks that his confession to the crimes was to expect leniency from death penalty, a senior Indian government official said.

In this undated handout file photograph released by Mumbai Police in December 2008, arrested Islamist militant Mohammed Ajmal Kasab is seen lying on a bed at an undisclosed location in Mumbai. (AFP/HO/File)

"If anyone feels that I am confessing to escape the death penalty then the court may without doubt hang me," the official quoted Kasab as telling special court judge M. L. Tahilyani at the Arthur Road jail in Mumbai.

Meanwhile, Kasab's lawyer Abbas Kazmi has alleged that Kasab was mentally tortured in the jail to confess.

To this, the special judge said that the court had taken all precautions to ensure that the confession made was voluntary and without external influence.

Kasab Monday pleaded guilty to all the charges brought against him by India.

He was charged with 302 crimes, including waging war against the state, for his involvement in the Mumbai terror attacks, which claimed the lives of over 170 people including a few foreign nationals on November 27 last year.